Piriqueta


Piriqueta is a genus of flowering plants belonging to Turneroideae.

Description

Piriqueta is a genus of herbs or subshrub dicots.

Morphology

Most members of Piriqueta are perennial or suffrutic herbs, there are some shrubs and some annual species.
All members of Piriqueta have the same floral organization: short calyx tubes that are attached to petal claws, coronas, and filaments. The peduncle and pedicels are free. Seeds are reticulate in all species, two thirds of the species have puberulent seeds, others have glabrous seeds. They are generally hairy, though some only have hair in the floral regions.
Over half of Piriqueta species have setiform glandular hairs and tuberculate fruits, some with axillary inflorescences.
Various members of Piriqueta, see list below, have a unique reproductive system called distyly, in which, two floral morphs are present which differ in their placement of anthers and style length. More rarely, some species show tristyly in which three floral morphs are present.

Karyotype

30% of Piriqueta are polyploids. The basic chromosome number is x=7.

Taxonomy

Piriqueta was originally described in 1775 by J. F. B. Fusée Aublet in Histoire des plantes de la Guiane Françoise, 1877. In this book, he describes Piriqueta villosa. Aublet describes P. villosa as being deciduous, with ovate hairy leaflets, having five "scaly" petals with cup alternation, five filaments, ovate and bilocular anthers, five six-branched pistils with flat fleshy wide stigmas, and being covered in red stiff hairs.
In 1777, Giovanni Antonio Scopoli would publish the genus under Burghartia and would place the genus in the tribe Sauvagesieae of Ochnaceae.
In 1789, Johann Christian Daniel von Schreber would publish the genus under Burcardia. The description is similar to that of Aublet's with the exception of the petals described as "heart" shaped.
Scopoli's and Schreber's descriptions both refer to Piriqueta as a synonym, neither provided type species in their descriptions.

Distribution and habitat

Members of Piriqueta have native ranges throughout tropical and subtropical regions of North, Central, and South America.
Various members of Piriqueta have been introduced to Java, Malaysia, and Thailand.

Species

As of 2023, there are 46 accepted species of Piriqueta.
  • Piriqueta abairana 2
  • Piriqueta araguaiana 2
  • Piriqueta asperifolia 2
  • Piriqueta assurensis 1,2
  • Piriqueta aurea 2
  • Piriqueta breviseminata 2
  • Piriqueta caiapoensis 2
  • Piriqueta carnea 2
  • Piriqueta cistoides ssp. cistoides 2
  • Piriqueta cistoides ssp. caroliniana 1
  • Piriqueta constellata 2
  • Piriqueta corumbensis 2
  • Piriqueta crenata
  • Piriqueta cristobaliae 2
  • Piriqueta densiflora 2
  • Piriqueta dentata 2
  • Piriqueta douradinha 2
  • Piriqueta duarteana 2
  • Piriqueta emasensis 2
  • Piriqueta flammea 2
  • Piriqueta grandifolia 2
  • Piriqueta guianensis 2,3
  • Piriqueta hapala 1
  • Piriqueta lourteigiae 2
  • Piriqueta mesoamericana 2
  • Piriqueta mexicana 1
  • Piriqueta morongii 1,2
  • Piriqueta mortonii 1
  • Piriqueta nanuzae 2
  • Piriqueta nitida 2
  • Piriqueta ochroleuca 2
  • Piriqueta pampeana
  • Piriqueta plicata 2
  • Piriqueta racemosa 1,2
  • Piriqueta revoluta 2?
  • Piriqueta rosea 2
  • Piriqueta sarae 2
  • Piriqueta scabrida 2
  • Piriqueta sidifolia ssp. sidifolia2
  • Piriqueta sidifolia ssp. multiflora2
  • Piriqueta suborbicularis 2
  • Piriqueta subsessilis 2
  • Piriqueta sulfurea 2
  • Piriqueta tamberlikii ssp. rotindifolia2
  • Piriqueta tamberlikii ssp. tamberlikii2
  • Piriqueta taubatensis 2
  • Piriqueta undulata 2
  • Piriqueta venezuelana 1?
  • Piriqueta viscosa 1
Notes on the number of floral morphs
1,2,3 denote the number of floral morphs ? Denotes uncertain annotations. Those unannotated are missing data.

Formerly placed in the genus